Suppression of discovery of mobile devices in a wireless network

Abstract

Technologies are generally described for suppressing discovery of mobile devices in a wireless ubiquitous computing (ubicomp) network, reducing the number of network transmissions by devices in the network and reducing network congestion and prolonging battery life. A mobile device may add supplementary information to introductory beacons transmitted by the device that indicate no response is necessary from other devices participating in the network except for a coordinator of the network. The mobile device may transmit a malformed introductory beacon that will be ignored by other devices in the network except for the coordinator. The coordinator of the wireless network may detect the mobile device moving through the network and transmit a suppression signal to other devices in the network causing the devices to ignore the introductory beacons transmitted by the mobile device.

I claim: 
     
       1. A computer-implemented method to suppress a response of a wireless network device to an introductory beacon transmitted by a mobile device to discover the wireless network device in a wireless network, wherein the wireless network comprises the wireless network device and a coordinating device, the method comprising:
 detecting, by the coordinating device, the mobile device moving through the wireless network; 
 in response to detecting the mobile device, suppressing, by the coordinating device, the response of the wireless network device to the introductory beacon, wherein suppressing the response of the wireless network device includes transmitting a suppression signal, from the coordinating device to the wireless network device, to ignore the introductory beacon. 
 
     
     
       2. The computer-implemented method of  claim 1 , wherein the suppression signal is transmitted in response to a malformed introductory beacon included in the introductory beacon. 
     
     
       3. The computer-implemented method of  claim 2 , wherein the coordinating device of the wireless network is configured to directly respond to the mobile device by indicating that the malformed introductory beacon was received. 
     
     
       4. The computer-implemented method of  claim 2 , wherein the coordinating device of the wireless network is configured to respond to the malformed introductory beacon that causes the mobile device to engage in a unicast discovery process directly with the coordinating device. 
     
     
       5. The computer-implemented method of  claim 1 , wherein the detecting the mobile device moving through the wireless network further comprises receiving embedded supplementary information in the introductory beacon which indicates the mobile device is a mobile device. 
     
     
       6. The computer-implemented method of  claim 1 , wherein slave or child nodes of the coordinating device send communications with the mobile device through the coordinating device to prevent mutual knowledge between the slave or child nodes. 
     
     
       7. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having computer-executable instructions, to suppress a response of a wireless network device to an introductory beacon transmitted by a mobile device to discover the wireless network device in a wireless network, that in response to execution by a computing device, cause the computing device to perform or control performance of operations to:
 detect the mobile device that moves through the wireless network, wherein the wireless network comprises the wireless network device and the computing device; 
 in response to the detection of the mobile device, suppress the response of the wireless network device to the introductory beacon, wherein the operation to suppress the response of the wireless network device includes at least one operation to transmit a suppression signal, from the computing device to the wireless network device, to ignore the introductory beacon. 
 
     
     
       8. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 7 , wherein the introductory beacon comprises embedded supplementary information. 
     
     
       9. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 7 , wherein the suppression signal transmitted by the computing device comprises a routing table update transmission. 
     
     
       10. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 7 , wherein the suppression signal comprises invalid values. 
     
     
       11. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 7 , wherein the wireless network includes a wireless personal-area network (WPAN). 
     
     
       12. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 7 , having further computer-executable instructions stored thereon that cause the computing device to, upon the detection of the mobile device that moves through the wireless network, multicast information regarding the mobile device to another computing device of the wireless network. 
     
     
       13. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 7 , wherein the suppression signal is transmitted in response to a malformed introductory beacon included in the introductory beacon. 
     
     
       14. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 13 , having further computer-executable instructions stored thereon that cause the computing device to respond to the mobile device to indicate that the malformed introductory beacon was received. 
     
     
       15. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 13 , having further computer-executable instructions stored thereon that cause the computing device to respond to the malformed introductory beacon that causes the mobile device to engage in a unicast discovery process directly with the computing device. 
     
     
       16. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 7 , wherein the operation to detect the mobile device that moves through the wireless network includes at least one operation to receive embedded supplementary information in the introductory beacon which indicates the mobile device is a mobile device. 
     
     
       17. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of  claim 7 , wherein slave or child nodes of the computing device send communications with the mobile device through the computing device to prevent mutual knowledge between the slave or child nodes. 
     
     
       18. A computing device that suppresses responses of devices that participate in a wireless network to an introductory beacon transmitted by the computing device that moves through the wireless network, wherein the introductory beacon is used to discover a neighboring device in the wireless network, and wherein the wireless network comprises a neighboring device and a coordinating device, the computing device comprising:
 a transmitter that transmits a malformed introductory beacon the neighboring device in the wireless network, wherein the neighboring device in the wireless network ignores the malformed introductory beacon; and 
 a receiver that receives a response to the malformed introductory beacon from the coordinating device of the wireless network, 
 wherein, upon reception of the response from the coordinating device, the transmitter transmits an introduction transmission directly to the coordinating device.